Plenary session, 2017 Australasian Aid Conference

The humanitarian aid system is in crisis. It’s a crisis of identity, financing and conduct. Agencies set up to deal with the immediate impacts of traumatic events find themselves have become de facto providers of long-term development assistance to displaced communities. Agencies set up to develop global norms and provide technical assistance to governments are facing pressure to coordinate flash responses to transboundary threats. In aggregate, funding for crisis response falls far short of needs and is ad hoc and short-term. Humanitarian actors are more than ever divided over traditional principles of humanitarian action, particularly independence and impartiality. Many of these problems have been thrown into sharp relief by the civil conflict in Syria and its impacts in surrounding countries over the past five years. Arguably, global summitry in 2015 and 2016 has done little to alleviate the humanitarian aid crisis. In a business-as-usual scenario, will implementing agencies really become better coordinated and more efficient, and donors more generous, flexible and willing to increase support for local actors? This panel discussion will air a diversity of perspectives on the state of the humanitarian aid system and options for improving it. Disagreement is guaranteed. So too are concrete ideas.

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